Press Trust Of India
Saharsa, Dec 14: A 65-year-old woman committed ‘sati’ by jumping into the funeral pyre of her husband in a village in Bihar’s Saharsa district, police said
Superintendent of Police Pankaj Sinha said it happened at Parminia under Kahra block, 250 km from Patna, and the deceased woman has been identified as Dahwa Devi.
‘‘Dahwa’s husband Charitra Yadav (70) had been suffering from cancer for a long time. He died Saturday. His children and relatives arrived in the afternoon and took his body for cremation in the village,’’ the SP said.
The last rites got over by evening. The mourners returned and were taking bath near a borewell. The woman and her daughter-in-law had remained at their home as per the custom.
Meanwhile, Yadav’s son Ramesh Mandal started searching for his mother so that she could also take a bath, but she was nowhere to be found. Someone told the grieving family that Devi was going towards the place where Yadav was cremated.
‘‘Mandal and other family members ran towards the place and saw that Devi had already jumped into the funeral pyre and died. They then performed her last rites too in the same pyre,’’ Sinha said.
The SP, who had rushed to the village to investigate the incident, said funeral pyres in Saharsa are traditionally made of timber, sandalwood and cow-dung cakes. The pyre into which Devi jumped had much fire when the incident happened.
The entire incident happened within 30 minutes after Yadav’s cremation rites were over. ‘‘We have probed the incident and taken video-recorded statements of the villagers. They all have corroborated the incident. Devi was grieving, but was otherwise mentally sound. We have taken it as a suicide and not filed a case in the matter,’’ the SP said.